Sinclair Broadcast Group Inc. is buying Tribune Media Co. for about $3.9 billion, a deal made possible after the U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted last month to ease a limit on TV-station ownership in the U.S.
Sinclair will pay $43.50 a share to gain Tribune TV stations in big media markets like New York, Chicago and Miami, strengthening its hand in negotiations with pay-TV distributors and major broadcast networks like 21st Century Fox Inc.
The marriage of Sinclair and Tribune, two of the largest local TV station owners in the U.S., creates a U.S. broadcasting behemoth to face down online competitors vying for a piece of the local advertising pie. The deal, expected to be the first in a mergers-and-acquisitions frenzy following an historic airwave auction, sent the shares of Tribune surging as high $43.04 in New York.
Fox and Nexstar had also been looking to make the first splash in
